January 24, 2018

Arts

On the first Thursday of every month, hundreds head to Pioneer Square to check out the latest art shows.Seattle’s oldest neighborhood is home to dozens of galleries and the First Thursday Art Walk, from 6 to 8 p.m., is when they often showcase new exhibits.

First Thursday parking is free from 5 – 10 p.m. at Frye Garage (117 Third Ave. S.) and Butler Garage (114 James St.). To redeem, pick up a voucher at participating Pioneer Square stores, restaurants or galleries.

News

Maru Mora-Villalpando received the notice just before Christmas: a certified letter from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) called a “notice to appear,” starting off deportation proceedings.

This was a deliberate tactic, Mora-Villalpando said, used to silence her and her years of activism fighting for immigrant rights, particularly working against the Northwest Detention Center, a facility in Tacoma that can hold up to 1,575 people, making it one of the largest immigration prisons in the United States.

Seattle alternative rock band Pearl Jam announced that it would play two “Home Shows” in August to unite the community around the cause of ending homelessness.

The concerts — scheduled for Aug. 8 and Aug. 10 — will be held at Safeco Field. The band has pledged $1 million to local organizations combatting homelessness and hopes that they will be able to up that figure to $10 million.

Gov. Jay Inslee signed the capital budget into law on Jan. 18, missing a crucial deadline for affordable housing projects that rely on federal tax credits.

The capital budget funds a wide variety of infrastructure and housing projects. It had been held up in the legislature because Republican lawmakers demanded a legislative fix to a water-rights issue that was technically unrelated to the budget itself.

In November 1994 Secretary of Labor Robert Reich stood before the Democratic Leadership Council and warned that economic inequality was creating a “two-tiered society.” He was worried, he said, that a growing number of angry and disillusioned Americans could be “easily manipulated.”

“Once unbottled, mass resentment can poison the very fabric of society, the moral integrity of a society, replacing ambition with envy, replacing tolerance with hate,” Reich said at the time.

Features

When you enter “Moon Moan” at 950 Gallery in Tacoma, the artists hope you’ll leave your typical interpretations of an art exhibition outside the door. Raven Juarez and Asia Tail would prefer visitors look at their art in an intuitive way — to a time when you didn’t think of the sky as being only blue and grass only green. Before being taught “the rules,” when your imagination ran wild.

Opinion

President Donald Trump’s administration just took another step toward creating a police state, with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) on the cutting edge as it begins to deport immigrants who actively campaign against our unjust immigration laws or, for that matter, even make the mistake of talking to the press.

This hit home when an old friend of mine, Maru Mora-Villalpando, got a letter from ICE telling her that they were initiating deportation proceedings against her.

I have been at Real Change now for just over two months, so I thought it was time I introduced myself. My name is Shelley Dooley, and I’m the new managing director. My friends and colleagues were surprised that I took this job. I’ve never been known as a visible advocate and certainly would not consider myself a writer. What I do bring to Real Change is 25 years of direct service to single adults who struggle, significant work in supportive housing and extensive administrative skills. When I applied for this job, I felt it was a long shot and never expected to get an interview.

I am writing this in a pit of uncertainty, when there’s a whole lot of news on its way I can’t see because I’m stuck in the past. It’s at least Wednesday Jan. 24, 2018, when you read this, but for me writing, it’s Jan. 19, and not even 7 a.m.

The biggest news approaching me I can’t see, but you, in the future, can, is the pending federal government shutdown-or-not. My guess is there will be a shutdown.

Vendor profiles

If one thing is certain, it’s that you won’t have to ask Mark Southworth if he’s “working hard or hardly working.” “I started working when I was 7 years old on a 154 acre dairy farm back in upstate New York. In the summertime it was hot. Winter time? Forget it! You freeze more or less. But I did what I had to up until my dad passed away back in ’65. And then we sold the farm, because that was one of his wishes. He said ‘if anything happens to me the farm goes.’” Mark hadn’t stopped “working hard” until he absolutely had to.